On Tuesday 17 February, the European Commissioner for Defence, Andrius Kubilius, called on the Council of the EU and the European Parliament to make progress in discussions on the military mobility package presented by the European Commission last November (see EUROPE 13755/1). In an own-initiative report from December, the European Parliament had already supported the European Commission’s idea of a ‘military Schengen’ (see EUROPE 13775/17).
“The first negotiations between Parliament and Council on this package are expected this summer. And I hope they too will own the clock and approve this legislation as soon as possible”, emphasised Andrius Kubilius in a speech in Vilnius. According to one source, interinstitutional negotiations could begin in the middle of July.
In the European Parliament, the vote on the text by co-rapporteurs Michał Szczerba and Roberts Zīle could take place in the Transport Committee, and the Security and Defence Committee at the end of June. A political debate on military mobility is scheduled for the ‘Transport’ Council meeting on 8 June.
According to the Commissioner, “there is no credible deterrence without military mobility”. “Military mobility determines whether European solidarity and collective defence is theoretical or operational. It determines whether reinforcement is credible or delayed. It determines whether deterrence is convincing or uncertain”, he added, believing that without mobility, solidarity risked becoming symbolic.
Andrius Kubilius noted that military mobility is currently very complicated in the EU, whether in terms of infrastructure, bureaucracy or legal issues. “It could take weeks or even months to move troops from one end of Europe to the other”, he said, recalling why the European Commission had proposed a military mobility package last November.
“Deterrence depends not only on the forces we possess, but on our ability to deploy and sustain them”, insisted the Commissioner, who was of the opinion that for the countries on Europe’s eastern flank, military mobility was “a matter of life and death”.
The European Commission’s proposal for military mobility in the next Multiannual Financial Framework is €17.651 billion, ten times the amount of the current Multiannual Financial Framework (see EUROPE 13682/6). (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)